Date:         Mon, 2 Jun 1997 17:41:08 -0700 (PDT)
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         Charles D Earl <cdearl@cats.ucsc.edu>
Subject:      fog light wiring questions

 
I'm ready to begin the project of installing my new Hella 500 fog lights 
on the van (thanks for the suggestion Sean).  The quality seems 
excellent, however, the instructions are somewhat vague.  I'm unable to 
check the archives as I currently have no internet access.  Perhaps one 
of you has done this or knows electronics better than I :)

1)Type of installation:  independant or with parking lights.  If wired 
through parking lights, is there a heavy load being put upon the parking 
light switch/circuit even though power from the battery is being supplied 
to a relay (55 watt)?  To do this the instructions show a wire running 
from the relay to the switch.  Then you run a wire from the switch to the 
parking light.  The parking light has 3 wires, which one do I connect to, 
the brown one (I think this is ground), blk w/white stiped one or gray 
with blk strips one.  The switch confuses me, the diagram only shows 2 
wires running from it, relay to switch and parking light to switch.  Yet, 
the switch has 3 connections on it:  earth, load and supply.  Is the wire 
from the relay the load, does supply go to the parking light (its an 
illuminated switch) and do I additionally ground the earth connection?

Doing it independantly.  Perhaps this is simpler, but the instructions 
don't cover this.  It seems the only difference would be that I can run 
the fog lights by themselves, something I wouldn't do, but, thats why I 
wonder if the parking light method runs the risk of burning up the 
parking/headlight switch.  Doing it independantly would bypass this.  The 
wiring/switch/relay supplied seems very heavy duty.  

So if I do it independantly, do I ground the switch instead of running it 
to the parking light?  And again, which of the 3 connections on the 
switch do I use for what.

2)1 of the examples in the instructions seems to show how to hook the fog 
lights up in conjunctins with the highbeams, something I would do with 
driving lights but not with fog lights.  However, 1 of the 4 connections 
on the relay seems to be just for connecting to the highbeams (the other 
3 are:  battery to relay, relay to both fog lights and relay to 
switch).  The instructions don't show what to do if you're not using the 
highbeams.  Do I just leave it empty, if I hook the fog lights up 
independantly or with the parking lights, or do I need to ground it or 
something else?

A lot of questions, I know.  And I would be very grateful If anyone has 
any advice.  I'm worried about frying something!  Mounting the lights and 
running the wires is no problem, just the actual attachments!
TIA!

Charles
'83.5 Westy (wants to see in fog!)